The Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited has sold its first batch of Port Harcourt low-sulfur straight-run fuel oil (LSSR) to Dubai-based Gulf Transport & Trading Limited (GTT). The cargo will soon be loaded onto the Wonder Star MR1 ship, marking the start of operations at the refinery and the export of petroleum products.
The ship will load 15,000 metric tons of the product, which translates to about 13.6 million liters.
Although the volume coming from the NNPC into the global market is still small, the development has the potential to impact the Very Low Sulphur Fuel Oil (VLSFO) benchmarks in the future while changing the market realities for Atlantic Basin exporters into Nigeria and other regions.
The sulfur content of the export by NNPC stands at 0.26 percent per wt and a 0.918 g/ml density at 15°C, according to Kpler, a data and analysis company.
The cargo was reportedly sold at an $8.50/t discount to the NWE 0.5 percent benchmark on a Free on Board (FOB) basis.
Kpler reported that this development will reduce reliance on traditional suppliers in Africa and Europe. With Nigeria’s declining clean petroleum product (CPP) imports, the trend is already driving down imports across the broader West African region.
